Each day of the Francophone Forum, XOESE, the Francophone Women’s Fund organized plenary sessions that aimed to address topics related to the different themes of each day of the Francophone Forum, November 23-26, 2021. For some context, the main theme of the Forum was on how we can contribute to strengthening the Francophone women’s movement, and each day of the Forum focused on a different sub-theme. The sub-themes were :
- The challenges of working and being an activist in the movement
- Funding the movement: challenges and opportunities in the digital age
- Strengthening the intergenerational and intersectional nature of the movement
- Health and safety of the FDDH: celebrating the achievements and successes of the movement taking care of us
The plenary session on the first day of the Forum, Tuesday, November 23, 2021, was the opening ceremony and official launch of XOESE, the Fund for Francophone Women. During this session, the Director of XOESE introduced the Forum and the fund she founded in 2015, finally announcing the official launch of XOESE, the Fund for Francophone Women.
In introducing the Forum, she covered its context, its objectives, the space it provided for participants, its focus and the activities that would take place throughout the rest of the week.
To learn more about these key points click here.
In officially launching XOESE as a foundation, the Director introduced what the fund is as an actor in the movement, its mission and vision, what it does and how it does it, for whom it does it, and its positive impact on the lives of women throughout the Francophone world of the Deep South.
On the second day of the Forum, the plenary session was “Financing the Movement: Challenges and Opportunities.” This session covered:
- A synthesis of the development and concerns with funding for movement initiatives
- The importance of sharing experiences and strategies that work
- Strengthening leadership for funding
The plenary session on Thursday, November 25 was “Strengthening Intergenerationality and Intersectionality in the Movement: Strategies and Affirmative Action. The main topics of this session were:
- Issues of collaboration between the different generations of feminists currently in the movement
- The specific needs of women with disabilities / Aboriginal women
- How to encourage diversity within the movement
- Strengthening links between women’s groups and marginalized women’s groups.
The recordings of these three sessions are available on our youtube channel.
And learn more about the first edition of the Francophone Gender Equality Award by watching the attached award ceremony and reading about the session and our three inspiring winners.
At the beginning of the last day of the Francophone Forum, XOESE hosted a Francophone award ceremony to celebrate the three winners of the first edition of the Francophone Gender Equality Award. This plenary session (left) also served as the closing ceremony of the Francophone Forum.
